Bracelet monitors stress levels

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Scott Bureau

RIT students Cara Steinberg, left, Alexia Bernardo and Claire Noble work on their Wearable Stress Monitor prototype before the Imagine RIT festival, held May 7. The Women in Computing team will have festivalgoers test out the bracelet and app, aimed at helping children with anxiety and stress.

Keep calm and carry on, as you test out the stress monitor bracelet and app at the Imagine RIT: Innovation and Creativity Festival on May 7.

Students from RIT’s Women in Computing group will show how they created a wearable stress monitor prototype, aimed at helping children and those with stress and anxiety. The interactive exhibit, located in the Computer Zone in the Golisano Hall atrium, will allow festivalgoers to try out the bracelet and accompanying app.

The cuff-style bracelet uses the wearable electronics platform Flora to detect the pulse and stress levels of the person wearing the device. A Galvanic Skin Response (GSR) Sensor in the bracelet allows the device to detect changes in skin pore sizes and correlate that information to certain emotional ranges, such as happiness, sadness and anger. Using an accelerometer, the bracelet can also sense the activity level of the user.

“All of that information connects through Bluetooth to an Android app that we also created,” said Alexia Bernardo, a first-year game design and development major from Pine Bush, N.Y. “We can use this information to help children with anxiety calm themselves when no one else is around to help them.”

The bracelet can display a customized soothing colorful light pattern to reduce the stress of someone wearing it. The app interprets the readings, including pulse, into a graph. The app can also contact friends or family that can help the user, if needed.

The project is being created by Bernardo; Claire Noble, a second-year web and mobile computing major from Berkeley, Calif.; Cara Steinberg, a second-year computer science major, from Monroe, N.Y.; and Matthew Crocco, a first-year computer science student from Oceanside, N.Y. The team began the project last fall as part of the Women in Computing Projects Committee, where students can come together to work on extracurricular multidisciplinary projects. Another team of WiC students will showcase their Raspberry Pi game emulators in the Golisano Atrium at Imagine RIT.

“We see the monitor and app as a possible alternative to medicating children with stress and anxiety,” said Noble. “After Imagine RIT, we plan to continue adding to and improving the monitor, in hopes of helping improve people’s lives.”

To learn more about Imagine RIT and plan your day for May 7, go to rit.edu/imagine.